Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Mission
On its website states that "There are two simple values that lie at the core of the foundation’s work: All lives—no matter where they are being led—have equal value; To whom much has been given, much is expected. Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to reduce inequities and improve lives around the world." 

Program Areas
In developing countries, it focuses on improving health, reducing extreme poverty, and increasing access to technology in public libraries. In the United States, the foundation seeks to ensure that all people have access to a great education and to technology in public libraries. In its local region, it focuses on improving the lives of low-income families.

Controversies
Concerns have been raised about the decision of the Gates to invest in Monsanto. Reportedly, the shares are valued at $23 million. Monsanto has been involved in numerous controversial agri-business activities, including genetic engineering of seeds and efforts to use a "terminator" gene to control germination.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is also a major investor in BP, with nearly 43 million shares, a company whose lax regulatory record has been seen as a big factor in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster.

The Foundation has also given $300,000 to the US-based geoengineering research body Silver Lining, which is developing machines to convert seawater into microscopic particles to be sprayed into clouds, to reflect more sunlight back into space in an effort to mitigate the worst effects of global warming. The Gates-backed sea trial would be the largest known attempt to geoengineer the climate so far, reported to be conducted over an area of 10,000km2. Campaigners say such a large-scale trial is 'risky' and that a global ban on geoengineering experiments should be put in place until regulations governing the sector can be introduced. Bill Gates has also given $4.5 million to climate researcher David Keith, of the University of Calgary, and Ken Caldeira of the Carnegie Institution for Science, to fund research on planet-cooling ideas.

Leadership 2010

 * Bill Gates, Co-chair and Trustee
 * Melinda French Gates, Co-chair and Trustee
 * William Gates Sr., Co-chair
 * Warren Buffett, Trustee
 * Jeff Raikes, Chief Executive Officer
 * Sylvia Mathews Burwell, President, Global Development Program
 * Allan C. Golston, President, United States Program
 * Tachi Yamada, President, Global Health Program
 * Martha Choe, Chief Administrative Officer, Foundation Operations
 * Connie Collingsworth, General Counsel and Secretary, Foundation Operations
 * Richard Henriques, Chief Financial Officer, Foundation Operations
 * Kate James, Chief Communications Officer, Foundation Operations
 * Geoff Lamb, Managing Director, Public Policy, Foundation Operations
 * Franci Phelan. Chief Human Resources Officer, Foundation Operations

==Leadership and Executive Committee (1999) == Founders - Bill Gates III and Melinda Gates Co-Chairs - William H. Gates, Sr. and Patty Stonesifer Executive Committee
 * Richard Akeroyd, Executive Director, Libraries and Public Access to Information
 * Jack Faris, Ph.D., Director of Community Strategies
 * Allan C. Golston, CPA, Chief Financial and Administrative Officer
 * Terrence Meersman, Senior Program Officer
 * Gordon W. Perkin, M.D., Director, Global Health Program
 * Tom Vander Ark, Executive Director, Education

Trustees and Key Staff
As of June 2006
 * Patty Stonesifer, CEO
 * William H. Gates, Sr., Co-chair
 * Bill Gates, Co-chair
 * Melinda French Gates, Co-chair
 * Allan C. Golston, President, U.S. Programs
 * Dr. Tadataka Yamada, President, Global Health (Tachi Yamada)
 * Sylvia M. Mathews, President, Global Development
 * Cheryl Scott, Chief Operating Officer

Leadership 2008

 * Bill Gates, Co-chair
 * Melinda French Gates, Co-chair
 * William H. Gates Sr., Co-chair
 * Patty Stonesifer, Chief Executive Officer
 * Allan C. Golston, President, U.S. Program
 * Dr. Tadataka “Tachi” Yamada, President, Global Health Program
 * Sylvia Mathews Burwell, President, Global Development Program
 * Alex Friedman, Chief Financial Officer
 * Connie Collingsworth, General Counsel
 * Martha Choe, Chief Administrative Officer
 * Heidi Sinclair, Chief Communications Officer
 * Geoff Lamb, Managing Director of Public Policy

PR Staff

 * Heidi Sinclair

Global Development Program Advisory Panel
Accessed December 2007:


 * Rajat Gupta (Chair), Chairman of the Board, India School of Business; former Managing Director, McKinsey & Company
 * Amina J. Ibrahim, Senior Special Assistant to the President on the Millennium Development Goals, The Presidency, Nigeria
 * Kavita Nandini Ramdas, President and CEO, Global Fund for Women
 * Lawrence H. Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor at Harvard University; former President, Harvard University; former Secretary, United States Treasury
 * Ernesto Zedillo, Director, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization; former President of Mexico
 * Philip Zelikow, White Burkett Miller Professor of History, University of Virginia; former Counselor, U.S. Department of State

U.S. Program Advisory Panel
Accessed December 2007:


 * Ann Fudge (Chair), former Chairman and CEO, Young & Rubicam Brands
 * Henry Cisneros, Chairman and CEO, CityView; former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
 * Christopher Edley, Dean, Boalt School of Law, University of California at Berkeley
 * Edward Glaeser, Professor of Economics in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University
 * Walter Massey, President Emeritus, Morehouse College

Former Staff

 * Richard Klausner, head of the global health program for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
 * Jacquelline Cobb Fuller

Past Grantees

 * 2006 Grantees, per website
 * 2005 Grantees, per website
 * 2000-2004 grantees, per website
 * 1994-1999 Grantees, per website

Foundation Facts and Figures
As of June 2006 Number of employees: 241 Endowment: $29.1 billion Total grant commitments since inception: $10.5 billion Total 2005 grant payments: $1.36 billion

Rank by Total Giving or by Assets
 * In 2004, according to the Foundation Center's report, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation ranked first in total giving ($1,255,762,783) as of fiscal date 12/31/2004.
 * In 2004, according to the Foundation Center's report, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation ranked first in total assets ($28,798,609,188) as of fiscal date 12/31/04.

Annual Reports

 * 2009 Annual Report
 * 2008 Annual Report
 * 2007 Annual Report
 * 2006 Annual Report
 * 2005 Annual Report
 * 2004 Annual Report
 * 2003 Annual Report
 * 2002 Annual Report
 * 2001 Annual Report
 * 2000 Annual Report
 * 1999 Annual Report
 * 1998 Annual Report

Contact Information
PO Box 23350 Seattle, WA 98102 Phone: (206) 709-3100 Email: info At gatesfoundation.org Web: http://gatesfoundation.org/default.htm

Related Sourcewatch

 * Gates Institute
 * Greg Shaw
 * Vicki Phillips
 * Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa
 * African Economic Research Consortium
 * GAVI Alliance
 * Rajiv J. Shah
 * Regina Rabinovich
 * INDEPTH
 * David Fleming
 * Joe Cerrell, Director, Global Health Policy & Advocacy
 * David Lane
 * Louis Boorstin
 * Michael Madnick
 * Vincent Ahonkhai - staff
 * Trevor Neilson - former Director of Public Affairs and Director of Special Projects
 * Mary Joyce

Media Statements By Gates Foundation

 * "Our Investment Philosophy: A note from chief operating officer Cheryl ScottView printable version", Media Statement, January 11, 2007.
 * Patty Stonesifer, "A foundation states its case", Los Angeles Times, January 14, 2007.

General Articles

 * Donna Gordon Blankinship, "Gates Foundation spends $1.7B on farming in Africa," San Diego Union Tribune, June 1, 2011.
 * John Vidal, "Innocents abroad?", Guardian (UK), October 16, 2003.
 * Donald G. McNeil Jr. and Rick Lyman, "In Buffett Gift, Challenge for Gates," International Herald Tribune, June 26, 2006. (Syndicated from the New York Times).
 * Timothy L. O'Brien and Stephanie Saul, "Buffett to Give Bulk of His Fortune to Gates Charity", New York Times, June 26, 2006.
 * "Warren Buffet to give $37B to Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation," Associated Press, June 25, 2006.
 * Donna Gordon Blankinship, "Foundation says Gates, Wife Involved", Associated Press Writer. June 15, 2006.
 * Eric Holt-Gimenez, Miguel A. Altieri, and Peter Rosset, "Ten Reasons Why the Rockefeller and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundations’ Alliance for Another Green Revolution Will Not Solve the Problems of Poverty and Hunger in Sub-Saharan Africa", Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy, October 2006, Food First Policy Brief No. 12.
 * Ted Nace, "Minnesota to Bill Gates: No new coal!" Gristmill, May 4, 2008
 * Charles Piller, Edmund Sanders and Robyn Dixon, "Dark cloud over good works of Gates Foundation", Los Angeles Times, January 7, 2007.
 * Charles Pillier, "Money clashes with mission: The Gates Foundation invests heavily in sub-prime lenders and other businesses that undercut its good works", Los Angeles Times, January 8, 2007.
 * Charles Pillier, "Gates Foundation to reassess investments: A decision to review its holdings for their social effects could lead others to rethink their policies", Los Angeles Times, January 11, 2007.
 * Charles Pillier, "Gates Foundation to weigh new limits", Los Angeles Times, January 12, 2007.
 * Charles Piller, "Gates Foundation to keep its investment approach", Los Angeles Times, January 14, 2007.
 * Andrew Jack, "Gates in snub to ethical investing", The Australian, January 15, 2007.
 * F. William Engdahl, "Doomsday Seed Vault" in the Arctic: Bill Gates, Rockefeller and the GMO giants know something we don’t, Global Research, December 4, 2007.
 * Michael Barker, "Bill Gates, Philanthropy, and Social Engineering? (Part 1 of 3)", Znet, July 16, 2008.
 * Michael Barker, "Bill Gates Engineers Another Green Revolution (Part 3 of 3)", Znet, August 8, 2008.
 * Joanne Barkan, "Got Dough? How Billionaires Rule Our Schools", Dissent, Winter 2011.
 * P. Sainath, "Gates, Buffet & the Art of Giving: Karma for Billionaires", Counterpunch, March 15, 2011. Sainath is the author of the 2002 book Everybody Loves a Good Drought: Stories from India's Poorest Districts
 * Mike Zapler, Bill Gates seeks Africa farm aid, Politico, May 25, 2011.